With the advent of enterprise networks and public networks such as the Internet, network communication methods and protocols have become commonplace for communicating data between one or more nodes. Such nodes may be, for example, personal computers (PCs), servers, and other types of computing systems. Communication occurs over many media forms, including air (e.g., wireless), copper cabling and fiber media, and is generally performed using one or more active devices that perform routing of data, switching, amplification of signals, or other functions relating to the forwarding of data.
These devices, referred to in the art generally as network communication devices or systems, receive data from nodes and depending on their configuration and other factors, forward the data onto other networks to one or more other nodes. Such network communication devices include, for instance, routers, bridges or switches, and repeaters. Each of these device types perform data forwarding at one or more levels. At the lowest level (e.g., a hardware level), a repeater receives a signal corresponding to data transmitted by a node or other network communication device, and the repeater “repeats” the received signal. Generally, the repeater will perform retiming and conditioning (e.g., amplification) of the signal before the signal is repeated onto a network.
In a bridge or switch, data within the transmitted signal is inspected, and data is forwarded based upon the inspected data. More particularly, bridges and switches forward data based upon data link information stored within a portion of a data link frame. According to the IEEE 802.1d bridging specification, data is forwarded based upon an inspection of a destination address of a node stored in a header of the data link frame. Forwarding decisions in bridged networks are generally assisted by topology-determination protocols (e.g., spanning tree) that determine where data should be forwarded.
In a router, data is forwarded according to a routing protocol that determines the topology of the network, and where data is routed along the topology. Network devices “learn” where to forward networks using routing protocols (e.g., OSPF, EIGRP, etc.) that assist the network devices to determine where to forward data. Occasionally, network devices have static configuration data (e.g., routing table entries, ACLs, etc.) that determine where data should be forwarded.
Network devices that implement repeating, bridging, and routing generally include interfaces (e.g., command line, web-based, or SNMP agent interfaces) through which network device configurations may be changed (e.g., by a network administrator or other user). More particularly, network devices may receive manual configuration changes in operating parameters that affect how the network device forwards data.
There are many types of routing devices that may be used to communicate data. For wireless networks such as those that communicate data in accordance with IEEE Standards 802.11a, 802.11b, 802.11g and/or 802.11n, these devices generally attach to a physical network such as Ethernet, and route data to and from devices within a wireless network. Generally, such devices need to be configured by an administrator (or end user) to setup network parameters that the device uses. For instance, such devices may operate in more than one forwarding mode as discussed above. More specifically, such devices may be configured to operate as routers, switch/bridges, or repeaters.
Also, interfaces associated with such devices may have one or more settings that need to be established before communication can occur. Settings for the interfaces include addresses (e.g., TCP/IP addresses for interfaces associated, for example, with LAN or WAN ports, or wireless network ports), subnet masks, domain name server (DNS) information, Dynamic Host Configuration Protocol (DHCP) settings, network address translation (NAT) configuration settings, encryption settings, service set identifier (SSID) information, and other information. Configuration of such settings is generally a time-consuming task, and requires technical knowledge above that of the ordinary computer user. What is needed, therefore, is an easier method for configuring such devices.